Sunday, April 01, 2007

hazardous greed - the neocon agenda strikes again

Taken straight from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's website...In July of 1970, the White House and Congress worked together to establish the EPA in response to the growing public demand for cleaner water, air and land. Prior to the establishment of the EPA, the federal government was not structured to make a coordinated attack on the pollutants that harm human health and degrade the environment. The EPA was assigned the daunting task of repairing the damage already done to the natural environment and to establish new criteria to guide Americans in making a cleaner environment a reality.

The mission of the Environmental Protection Agency is to protect human health and the environment. Since 1970, EPA has been working for a cleaner, healthier environment for the American people.

The Agency supports environmental education projects that enhance the public's awareness, knowledge, and skills to make informed decisions that affect environmental quality.

Uh-huh. Now let's compare this to a recent proposal unveiled by our esteemed and respected protectors of the environment...More than a half-million tons of hazardous waste annually could escape federal environmental regulations under a new proposal from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency....The deregulations would...no longer require companies to send hazardous materials to a permitted recycler. Instead, EPA is proposing that waste producers make 'reasonable efforts' to determine that off-site recyclers are 'legitimately' recycling the hazardous materials.

Somebody please argue with me that the only reason this is being proposed is not at the behest of jerkwad corporations trying to increase their profits by any means possible...and that the jerkwads in question don't have "our" government in their pockets. Quite simply, there is no other conceivable motive for this kind of proposal. As with everything else the neocons push for, greed is the sole catalyst. I hope like hell someone in congress has the stones to challenge this proposal in the most straightforward and obvious way - by comparing it to the EPA's own mission statements. But I'm not holding my breath.

So much for the "P" in EPA. In the meantime, you can read the entire article here...